1. “We also know how difficult that search for security can be, especially for a small nation like Israel in a tough neighborhood.” Israel is not so much a small nation as a military giant. Obama knows that because it is the U.S. that has done the most to make Israel flagrantly oversized in this regard. In doing so Washington allowed Israel to become the bully that dominates the neighborhood. In other words, the president, as almost all of his modern predecessors before him, was reversing the facts for the sake of domestic political advantage.
2. “No country can be expected to negotiate with a terrorist organization sworn to its destruction.” This reference was, of course, to Hamas. To call Hamas a “terrorist organization” is considerably out of date. Actually, it would be more fitting to assign the epithet to the Israeli government. That purveyor of state terrorism has brought sudden death to much larger numbers of innocent people than Hamas. And, using Obama’s logic, one might argue that Hamas should not be expected to negotiate with Israel, because Israel adamantly refuses to recognize it as the legitimately elected government of Palestine (which it is) and is “sworn to its destruction.” Further, as Palestine’s legally elected government, Hamas too has a right to defend itself against predatory neighbors.
3. “America’s commitment to Israel also flows from a deeper place–and that is the values we share.” There is something really embarrassing, actually downright humiliating, about the first African American president of the United States saying this about a prima facie racist state like Israel. Our two countries do not share any important values. This can be seen clearly in the fact that, when it comes to societal goals, the two lands are moving in starkly opposite directions. At least since the end of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s the United States has moved in the direction of greater and greater inclusiveness. This movement has not always been smooth and consistent. However, today President Obama himself stands as living proof that inclusiveness is the direction American society has consciously set for itself. Not so Israel. Here it is the opposite–exclusiveness is the goal. If you are not Jewish, the goal of Israeli society is to render you a second class citizen and, eventually, expel you altogether. In terms of democracy, this makes Israel as democratic as, say, Alabama circa 1950. As a nation, the United States has left that era behind. So tell me, where are the shared values?
Weariness and boredom set in when you listen to people repeat themselves endlessly. Within the democratic political realm, that is the obsessive spell lobbies can cast on politicians. It is a design flaw, if you will, in the democratic system. The lobbies act like jealous gods who need to hear the prayers of their devotees said again and again. I am loyal, I am yours, forever, forever. Deviation means blasphemy and blasphemy means that the gods will bestow their cash blessings on someone else come the next election cycle.
